


Precipice

by th_esaurus



Category: 3:10 to Yuma (2007)
Genre: Illustrated, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-07
Updated: 2016-08-07
Packaged: 2018-08-07 07:55:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,429
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7706656
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/th_esaurus/pseuds/th_esaurus
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Charlie called Ben <em>boss</em> the same way a preacher invokes the name of the Lord. The same way a married man whispers the name of his mistress.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Precipice

**Author's Note:**

> for littledozerdraws. illustrated by littledozerdraws. basically littledozerdraws is amazing.

Ben Wade knew how to take care of the tools of his trade. Only a fool let the chambers of his pistol turn to rust, or the casing of his bullets tarnish, or allowed his boys to go too long without women or whiskey. Privately, and sometimes publicly, Ben considered there to be a great many fools out on the plains, but at least they had the decency to run themselves into the ground more often than not. The desert treated their bones just as poorly as they treated their weapons. So it went.

He learnt how simple the needs of men were. The three great bastions that kept the world turning were women, fear and money; and money alone could buy the first and assuage the second. Bribes worked better than blubbery. So Ben kept his boys flush, their pockets bulging, and it tended to take care of the rest. He was widely considered a fine boss, and the one or two who'd voiced a dissenting opinion were dead now. So that went, too.

Charlie Prince was another beast entirely. It wasn't that Ben could not parse his needs - he had read the Bible cover to cover, of course he could damn well read a single man - but he did not know immediately how to account for them.

Charlie called Ben _boss_ the same way a preacher invokes the name of the Lord. The same way a married man whispers the name of his mistress.

He needed looking after, same as a gun, but Ben could not hand the task off to anyone else. He disassembled and worked over and reassembled the Hand of God personally; so it would be with Charlie Prince.

*

"Walk with me, Charlie," he said, one dusky evening. They were settled for the night in Douglas, having been waylaid on the mountain trail by a tenacious ranger from Texas who was in over his head and out of his jurisdiction. They had dipped through New Mexico and put a toe across the Texan border once or twice in recent months, and apparently Ben's mere presence was enough to make him wanted in a state now.

Granted, they had also raided three of the smaller, independent banks. But they had only taken loose change. Nothing to cry so about.

Nonetheless. They would spend the next few days in town, the boys needing regular socialising lest they get too feral from the mountain air. Charlie, the wildest of them all, had been circling Ben all night like a caged lion. He'd snarled off the attention of a few pretty girls, and one shyly pretty boy too, and had drunk more than his fill, and had angrily lost a game of blackjack and came close to turning the table before returning to his pacing.

He needed seeing to, before he became a liability.

"Walk with me," Ben said, and took him out of the bar, out of the street, out onto the cusp of the town.

It was a pleasant, painterly sort of sunset. Arizona dusks were invariably shades of red, rarely a purple or blue in the desert haze, but this one bled out wide into the clouds, made the mountains blush. Ben would have liked to sketch it, but he had other tasks at hand.

Away from the night's clamour, Charlie began to unwind. His chest was still tight, his nostrils still flared when he breathed out, but Ben had always been a balm to him. They had known each other five-some years - Ben guessed Charlie was well into his twenties, though the cut of his beard made him older, at a glance - and Ben was the only person who could calm Charlie after a quarrel or a fight. He did not always care too, of course, and Charlie had dispatched a fair few fools who crossed their path without a single glance or order. But he was an unbroken colt, and kept that way because it made him a stouter weapon. He could not often be trusted to rein in his temper.

Ben sometimes clucked at him with his tongue, the same way he did his horse, and Charlie would come to heel.

It was a dangerous power to have over a man like Charlie Prince. Even the most loyal horses can throw a rider from the saddle if spooked badly enough.

"Charlie," Ben started, deciding to be blunt. They were far enough from civilised society for it. "Do you see to yourself often enough?"

"Boss?"

"Do you take yourself in hand?"

Charlie seemed discomforted by the suggestion.

"Don't fret, boy, I'm not here to lecture you. Ain't worried about you turning blind and not being no use to me no more." Ben let out a sigh, and put his hand on Charlie's chest. He was not generous with his touch, and Charlie stopped at once, still. "I don't want you pent up," Ben said, low now. "It makes a man sloppy. Makes his temper flare. A poor shot."

"Have I let you down, boss?"

"Not yet, Charlie. I don't wanna see it come to that."

They had reached the cusp of a barn, just outside the town, a storage place for sacks of rice, potatoes, beans, all sorts of things to be shipped off from the train station at dawn. The lock had already been picked, and the place raided, though the hessian bags were so heavy, the would-be thief had only made off with two or three. The air was stale but not unpleasant, and reminded Ben of homely kitchens, tamales and stew. He had not properly eaten before he'd taken Charlie on this promenade. He would have to get it over with quickly.

With the barn door shut, there was barely any light at all. He could just about see the glint of Charlie's green eyes, wide with uncertainty.

"Come now," Ben said, soft enough. "Lie here. Lie with me."

"Boss—"

"I told you to lie, so get yourself down."

Ben's reasoning was this: he needed Charlie clear-headed, that was all. Needed him slaked, not distracted.

Ben could read a man with ease.

He knew Charlie Prince to be sweet on him. It was as much a fact as the sun rising in the east. If Charlie could not - would not - take his fancy out on boys who dealt a fair price for their mouths and their dignity, then—

Ben would have to see to it personally. Disassembled; worked over; reassembled. Charlie Prince, he assumed, could be no more complicated than a fine gun.

He waited for Charlie to go to his knees. The floor of the barn was dirty with flour, rice, dust, but at least not mud. They would be able to brush their clothes down after it was done.

Charlie, he noted, looked open and fearful. Obedient but perhaps against his better judgement. Ben was not always forthcoming with his plans; he liked to see how far Charlie could gauge him, how in sync they were with each other, and only chastised him gently when he misjudged Ben. Charlie would punish himself for that harder than Ben ever could. But here, now, he seemed to have no clue. There had been rough stories floating on the breeze about men caught lying together and hanged for the sin of it; or traps laid, some righteous avenger of the Lord, seducing men and leaving them castrated and bleeding once their breeches were unbuckled.

Charlie figured him to be a man of God, as did they all. Certainly Ben quoted his King James Bible often enough. But it was more that he found the imagery prescient, rather than any particular conviction in the words.

"Don't look so afeared," Ben said softly, and got down to the floor with him. He pushed Charlie onto his back. Charlie was not unhandsome, in this light or any other. His eyes were a little too frantic - though their green glint helped - but he had a strong nose, a neat beard, a slim waist and long enough legs. Ben did not see the point in lying with boys who were too girlish; why not then just make do with a woman? If he spent the night with a boy, he wanted stubble and strength, calloused hands.

It was no chore to kiss Charlie Prince. He did it softly, and felt a tremble run through Charlie's body, toe to tip, as though he were a lake, and Ben's kiss a thrown pebble.

"Don't misunderstand me, Charlie," Ben murmured, his lips still half brushing Charlie's. "This is a bargain, not a gift. You take this from me, and then we're done with it, you hear? No more of your wandering eyes, your dazed mind. I want my weapon back, not this besotted boy."

"I ain't mean to let you down, boss—" Charlie stuttered.

"You haven't, not yet, and you shan't," Ben muttered, his voice no more than a deep burr.

He let Charlie decide, then. Hovered above him, waiting.

He had often caught Charlie looking his way, and, on seeing Ben notice him back, scuff his boot or veer his gaze to the sky as if searching for a sign of God in the hazy expanse. Perhaps he would do the same now. Make his excuse, brush down his chaps, go back to the saloon to drink and fight. Ben hoped he would not.

He would have to break in Charlie some less pleasant way, if it came to that.

Charlie surged up all at once. Grabbed at Ben's jaw with his gloved hand, pulled their mouths together; almost right away got his lips parted and his tongue against Ben's. He had dreamt of this, perhaps. Jolted awake spent and ashamed from it.

 

 

"You wanna take the reins here, Charlie?" Ben asked, hot against Charlie's mouth.

Charlie hesitated.

Dropped his head back against the dusty floor, his neck bared.

So he wanted to be used. Ben could provide that well enough.

He was not a rough lover. He never saw the sense in it. He wanted to be memorable, and only saw the need for violence against violent men. Besides, if they were laying low in the same town a day or two, he might like to sleep with the same girl more than once, if she was amiable.

This, with Charlie Prince, would be a one-time thing.

Ben laid stop him, pressing Charlie into the floor, their legs tangling together so that Charlie could rut up if he wanted to, spend himself as soon as he needed. But he was patient, shaking with it, and let Ben lathe kisses down the side of his neck. His skin was always tender from the sun, and Ben's stubble rasped against it, but he soothed that burn quick enough with his tongue. He turned his ministrations back to Charlie's mouth, enjoying the taste of him: alcohol, rust, a cactus-flower sort of scent.

He pulled his knee up to settle between Charlie's thighs, and the boy groaned with the pressure against his cock.

"Ben," he whispered. He barely spoke it aloud, more just made the shape of Ben's name with his breath. Ben could not recall if Charlie had ever addressed him as such. Ben had always been his boss.

"I'll allow it," Ben murmured. It was enough to get Charlie starting up a low prayer, just his name, over and over again.

Ben had no desire to get undressed in this dusty barn. Instead, he hitched up his hips, unbuttoned his trousers with one hand, and did the same to Charlie. He had thought, beforehand, about not touching Charlie's cock, but that was not the point of the exercise. Give him what he wants, Ben mused, and he'll keep his end of the bargain all the better.

And so he kept on kissing Charlie, sweet as a long-absent lover, and put their cocks together in his palm, and started up a low thrust, just as steady as if he were trotting in the saddle.

Charlie clung to him, with his nails in the nape of Ben's neck He was prone to drawing blood from men. It seemed Ben would be no different.

"Let me—" Charlie stuttered. He did not have the right words for it, and was unromantic and blunt. "You can put it in my mouth—"

"All right," Ben soothed. He turned to his back for a moment, leaning up on his elbows to watch as Charlie went to it. His mouth was not well-versed in this sordid kind of poetry, and he could not take much more than half Ben's dick. Perhaps was scared to. Did not know his own limits. Ben reached a hand down and pressed on the back of his head, forced him down a little further, and Charlie gagged, spat, swore; apologised.

"No matter," Ben told him, kindly enough. Their hands would do the job just as well.

He found a better angle. Got Charlie on his side and yanked his trousers down a little further. Pressed his dick between the sweaty, slick valley of his thighs - "Bear down," Ben muttered, "That's it." - and he thrust there like he would a woman. Reached around so that Charlie could follow the motion and buck into his willing hand.

That would do the trick.

Charlie whined when he came, an equine sort of sound, high pitched and desperate. Ben was more used to the sensation, and did not make such a fuss of his own orgasm. Both of their seed mixed and mingled with the dust, and made an awful pulp on the floor.

Ben rolled them away from it. He had meant to part with Charlie quite soon after the deed was done, but Charlie held him. He was strong, as he should be, and Ben did not struggle against the embrace. When Charlie strained up to kiss him, though, Ben gave nothing back.

It was done with now.

Charlie sensed it. He was a sharp one. He would be sharper, now that Ben had given him some tenderness.

"You must keep your side of the bargain," Ben murmured against his lips.

There was a long and dangerous silence.

"I'll do so," Charlie said, at last. He swallowed. And then untangled himself from his boss, and got to his feet, and turned his back to Ben. Made himself respectable again.

*

It was, though necessary, a frustration to spit and shine a pistol every time it fired a goddamn bullet.

Ben trusted that Charlie Prince had been seen to now.

Whether it was true or not—


End file.
